Shortlist for the 2017 Celtic Mythology Short Story Competition

In summary, forty submissions were received for the  Irish Imbas: Celtic Mythology Short Story competition this year and the standard was far more diverse in terms of submission quality than for any of the previous competitions. As always, some submissions were of very high quality but quite a number this year really weren’t at a level quite ready for publication in that they needed significant review and editing. To be fair, this reflects the experience of the writers – some who are clearly at an early stage of their writing career. With some additional polish, there are some genuine gems there.

Again, this year, despite the changes to our criteria, we also received a number of what I’d call ‘ghost stories’ or ‘fantasy stories’ – stories that were actually very good but which related to issues and topics we don’t really deal with. That situation very much reflects one of the biggest problems Irish Imbas faces in trying to achieve its goals – the confusion of fantasy and mythology.

Most people have been raised with a kind of ‘Disneyfied’ understanding of what mythology’ is all about and commercial interests have been fostering that for the fantasy market for several decades. As a result, this isn’t a surprise but again we’ll have to change how we do things in the future to make that even clearer.

But enough of that. Here’s the short-list for the Celtic Mythology Short Story Competition 2017.

  • Homecoming by Damien J. Howard
  • Moireach by Donna Rutherford
  • The Ancient Ash by Margaret McCarthy
  • The Ford of The Fork by Will O’Siorain
  • The Shadow of the Crow by Jerry W. Vandal
  • The Quest of Oscar and Plor na mBan by Aoife Osborne

 

So What Happens Next?

Those authors who made the short-list will be looked at again for minor editing where needed before they’re sent onto the judges for final consideration. Four judges will then consider them (where I’ll have one vote out of the four). Last year, this had quite a big impact on the final outcome in that only three of the five stories I’d thought were going to be in the final publication actually made the final cut.

The winning authors and those being published in the final Celtic Mythology Collection will be announced around the beginning of March 2018.

Congratulations to all those who made the list and the best of luck. I’d also like to thank those of you who made the effort to submit but who didn’t make the shortlist. I can’t contact you all individually but several of you have excellent stories that I believe another publisher would snap up.

Maith agaibh!

Brian O’Sullivan

Public Art on the Irish West Coast

If you get over to Ireland’s west coast (or you’re already there!) you might want to check out some of the public art projects in Mayo. One of these – Tír Sáile – was Ireland’s largest public arts trail with fourteen separate sculptural emplacements set in specific sites along the north mayo coast. Originally conceived and implemented in in 1993 to coincide with the formal opening of the Céide Fields visitors’ centre (and the associated Mayo 5000 celebrations), the art trail starts in Killala and follows the coastal route around through Ballycastle, Belderrig and down to An Fód Dubh at the end of the Belmullet peninsula. Although there were originally 14 site-specific art installations, only eleven survive today (a number were decommissioned due to lack of maintenance).

Tír Sáile is actually a conceptually interesting project in that it involved the alignment of large structural artworks with some pretty rugged landscape and dramatic natural backdrops with the objective of producing sculptures that “added to rather than detracted from, their settings”. As part of this, one of the fundamental requirements was that only natural materials could be used to ensure the structure in sympathy with their surroundings.

Another aspect of the project was envisioning the utilisation of the old Irish tradition of meitheal where people in rural communities worked together with neighbours to bring in the hay or help out with some other urgent crop. Generally speaking, each farmer/property owner person would help out their neighbour in the knowledge that when they too needed help, that assistance would be reciprocated. This allowed communities to act as a team, build strong relationships and allow benefit to be shared for everyone.

Needless to say, as with all art projects Tír Sáile’s not all about art (Sheesh, really!). Part of the rationale for Tír Sáile (and no doubt part of the reason they managed to get so much public funding) was the justification that the structures and associated marketing would help draw people to that part of Ireland for tourism and local business development reasons. As usual however, when you mix two such different objectives, the results can be very hit and miss.

The success of the project will very much depend on a number of perspectives. From a commercial perspective (in terms of tourism and benefit to local businesses), it’s hard to know if the project was a success. The project was mixed (and overshadowed by) the success of Céide fields and, of course, Irish tourism marketing campaigns like the ‘Wild Atlantic Way’. No doubt there has been some financial evaluation of the project although with local government organisations, public art projects often tend to be ‘closed shop’ affairs, controlled by a certain number of people  with limited accountability and no meaningful consultation. In that respect, the ongoing planning corruption investigation carried out by the Irish Standards in Public Office Commission (SIPOC) doesn’t really inspire confidence.

From a personal perspective, the success of the various artistic installations will very much depend on personal taste. Some people loathe the installations, some people love them. Most people don’t actually seem to know about them (of the ten people I asked, maybe one had heard of them). From those structures I’ve seen (about five), I personally felt that some of the artworks worked whereas others really didn’t and, in this regard, it wasn’t really helped by the absence of any interpretive material (although given that these works are based one persons’s personal vision – not the public’s – I’m not sure how much this would help either).

Tonnta na mblianta was visually … meh. Tearmon na Gaoithe, set on a dramatic headland on Killala Bay, ironically seemed to have the aim of constricting that spectacular view to a single frame (which seems a bit daft). Other structures meanwhile like Court Henge seemed just seemed like a bad decision. The concept behind it (making a structure that looked like a court cairn) was apt but placing in its current location (by the Ballycastle Cottages) just seemed stupid.

Court Hence – poor positioning

 

Tonnta na mblianta – Meh!

Others will have a completely different view and that’s fine.

Another example of public art (again in north Mayo) is ‘The Crossing’ (a project funded by Mayo County Council, Fáilte Ireland and other stakeholders) which is a ráth-like structure around the blowhole at Dún Briste (Downpatrick Head).

 

The Crossing [Photo from North Mayo Art Trail]

I have to confess, this work really appealed to me and I liked the way it had been incorporated into the landscape but I did wonder why more of the rich local folklore hadn’t been incorporated. This became a bit clearer when I searched online and found the artist wasn’t a local at all but an American artist (Travis Price) associated with the Catholic University of America. His rationale behind the installation was explained as follows:

The Crossing evokes the struggle and the sublime slipstream between the mystical and the material, between cultural history and the eternal sacred.’

Hmmm. Right.

Have to admit my eyes glazed over there at ‘sublime slipstream’.

On a personal level, I’d hoped we’d grown out of that florid, wince-inducing language (‘mystical’, ‘spiritual’ etc) that foreigners tend to ascribe to Ireland and the Irish. It’s a bit sad to see local authorities in Mayo encouraging it on publicly-funded monuments.

Clearly, they weren’t using the meitheal approach!

Submission Titles for the Celtic Mythology Short Story Competition

It’s always fun to look through the titles of submissions for the Celtic Mythology Short Story Competition and this year has been no exception. Since we first started the competition (back in the Dark Ages of 2015), I’ve got into a routine of running through the title list without the author names attached just to see the kind of reaction the titles trigger.

A story title can often be extremely evocative but their interpretation, of course, is usually linked to the personal experience and background or the person reading them. As a result, what I’d read into a title would be very different to what another person would.

Despite the old saying, I’ve learned that these days you actually can judge a book by its cover – at least in terms of genre (except in those cases where you have an inept publisher). That doesn’t work with a story/book title, though. The gold standard for titles is to have something that’s evocative but which also gives you an accurate expectation of what you’re about to read. That’s quite a difficult skill to master.

These are the title that took my fancy from this year’s batch and the reasons why.

  • … Loves company – I thought this was a clever play on the expression ‘Misery loves Company’  and (I’m assuming) transforms it into something else entirely.
  • A Tune and a Magic Bicycle – Juxtaposition in a title always tends to make that title stronger, particularly where you mix the esoteric with the banal. I like this one
  • Away with the Fairies – Again a possible double meaning on the old expression used for people with dementia.
  • Fionn and the Banshee – Given my own special interest in the Fenian Cycle, this was always going to catch my eye. I’m intrigued to see how the author merges two such different cultural concepts.
  • Jimmy Macpherson’s Dream – On seeing this title I immediately thought of James MacPherson – a Scottish outlaw made famous by poet Robbie Burns. I have no idea if there’s a link or not.
  • Moireach – Interesting title. The word looks Irish in structure but it’s not one (a name?) I’m familiar with. Usually I run off to research the word when confronted by something like this but of course I won’t be doing this yet as I don’t want to spoil the story.
  • The Halloween Footballers – For some reason this just tickles me. I’m not quite sure why.
  • The Three Faces of Me – Again, I’ve imposed my own interpretation on this title based on my personal experience and background and have therefore assumed this has something to do with the triad system of Celtic/Gaelic belief. It’ll be interesting to see how completely wrong or right I was.

This year we ended up with a sharp decline in submissions compared to last year (from over seventy to thirty-five in this year’s slot).  I’m quite happy with this result as it means the additional clarification on criteria and entry requirements is working. Last year, we received at least 20 submissions which had absolutely nothing to do with mythology (some ghost stories, some stories vaguely related to Ireland and so on) despite the guidelines. We also received a large number of specific fantasy stories set in Ireland from authors that also seemed to have missed what we’re trying to do. It’s a bit distressing to receive these as we know people have made the effort of paying the $7 entry fee and yet they’re so completely off the mark, they can’t progress to the shortlist. This is particularly the case when you come across stories that are actually of excellent quality!

In any case, the 2017 submissions are currently undergoing an initial review to assess how many go through to the short-list. The results will be posted by the end of the month.

Thanks to all of you who’ve taken the time to submit.

 

PS: A note of apology is necessary for the delay in getting this post up. We’ve had a bit of a disastrous holiday period with yours truly managing to get himself baldy injured in a running accident and we’ve also suffered two separate IT malfunctions. Because of our regular back–up processes we haven’t lost any data but trying to find IT support to reboot our systems over the Christmas holidays (in New Zealand) has meant we’re about two weeks behind schedule. We should be back on track in the next few days.

The Mystery of the Bare-ass Dolmen Dancers

Back in the eighties in Ireland there was a famous ad going around from the Irish Development Authority (IDA), a government agency responsible for developing enterprise and attracting foreign investment. A component of one of their marketing campaigns, it consisted of a series of photos taken around some of our more famous prehistoric monuments (stone circles, passage graves, dolmens and so on). On this occasion though, those monuments were occupied by serious-looking Irish corporate types, standing around in business suits and looking about as comfortable as a funeral attendee in a clown costume.

The inference was pretty obvious of course. We’re the IDA! We are stable and dependable – just like the 2500+ year old prehistoric structures standing there in the background.

Needless to say, the IDA have long since been restructured and rebranded as ‘IDA Ireland’ which puts some of that arrogant hubris in perspective.

The IDA weren’t the only people drawn to the monoliths that dot the countryside, however. People have been visiting these monuments out of curiosity for centuries and to get a sense of perspective it’s good to remember that when the Celts first arrived in Ireland (sometime around 400-500 B.C.), those monoliths had already been standing for over a thousand years. It’s really no wonder the Celts were in such awe of them, an aspect I try to get across in my books (particularly the Fionn mac Cumhaill Series and the Liath Luachra Series).

Nowadays, Ireland makes a small fortune from cultural tourism associated with such sites, although such blatant commercial use would certainly have been frowned on until very recently. Up until the late-sixties or so, dolmens and standing stones were still very much localised features, respected and – in some cases – still feared due to the attribution of curses, hauntings and spirits from local folklore.

With the seventies and early eighties however, much of that reverence began to fade and in some cases a less … venerable approach to the monuments began to occur. Occasional complaints began to be heard about people (those feckin hippies!) dancing naked around some of the less-visited (but just as significant) monuments. Movies or television programmes would also throw up the old trope of “comely maidens dancing around a stone monument”. [Outlander anyone?’]

‘Dolmen Dancing’ was a throwaway term that I invented to reflect the societal change taking place over our generation with respect to the increased understanding of native history and the physical structures on our landscape associated with that. In a more practical sense of course, it also described what was actually happening as people got up front and personal with the monuments without fear of breaking any taboo. In fact, in some cases breaking taboos was actually the point.

My own, personal experience of Dolmen Dancing was up at the Poulnabrone Dolmen in Country Clare when I was part of a student group headed to Galway in a minibus for a sailing weekend. We ended up taking a slight detour to go and see the dolmen, arriving sometime in the early evening before it got too dark.

Given that we ‘d been drinking since noon, that we were in an isolated location without supervision and confronted by a famously revered monument … well, I’ll leave the rest up to your imagination. In my defence however, I will say however, that I am (of course) a fantastic dancer. No -one can compare after I’ve had a few scoops and my throwing of shapes on the dance floors of Cork is a matter of official record. I’m only sorry that my recall of the events at Poulnabrone is so hazy.

For years after the Domen Dancing incident, there were rumors floating around of compromising photos taken that day, stories in jest that invariably emerged after a fresh session of drinking. To be honest, no-one really believed them. Back in the late eighties, there weren’t any mobile phones – if they were, we didn’t have them. Cameras were also rare enough as they still took film and they were a pain to use after 3-4 pints. I did actually see three photos from that day but they weren’t exactly National Geographic material as the individual who took them had been just as steamed as the rest of us. One of the three he managed to take consisted of a close-up of his own foot (still wearing his boot), one was a picture of a section of rock that could have been anywhere in the country and the last was just a total blur. Needless to say, I wasn’t overly concerned.

Imagine my surprise earlier this year therefore, when I was browsing through a second-hand shop and came across a ripped magazine with the following images:

For a moment, I swear to God, my heart actually stopped. Even the haziness of the images seemed to fit my recollection of that particular day. I rummaged frantically through those ripped pages and it was only when I saw the photos had been taken by Robert Merrill (who?) that it finally dawned on me.
I wasn’t in them.

A bit more rummaging finally revealed the magazine’s cover.

So what the hell was the Arts in Ireland?
Who were the people dancing around Poulnabrone?

It took a bit of research work to find out what exactly was going on and it was only when I got home in September that I learned the Arts in Ireland magazine was a now defunct publication. Run in the seventies, it had been published by Charles Merill (the photographer) an American described online as a “self-made millionaire” and an “artist, gay activist and iconoclast”.

When living in Ireland, Charles had traveled to Poulonabrone in 73/74 and taken these photos (God knows with who but at least it wasn’t me!) and subsequently included them with a short written piece in a literary supplement of the 4th edition of The Arts in Ireland.

I read the associated piece by Merrill and, to be honest, it was quite surreal and typical of the romanticised spiritual tosh often written about Ireland during the 70s/80s by people from overseas. Essentially, it involves a story where he sees Isadora Duncan (an American dancer most famous for dying when her scarf got entangled in the wheel of a car – honestly, you couldn’t make this stuff up!) at Poulnabrone. Isadora talks a stream of nonsense about her Irish background (er….) and leaves Merill a message that “Ireland could become a cultural center in the world in the next few years.”

So there you go. All a bit surreal but the mystery was solved and, more importantly, my ass was – literally – out of the picture.

To be honest, I am a bit miffed by the discovery. Back in the late eighties, I’m sure I must have been all gung-ho and imagined I was doing something outrageously original. Now, of course, its clear someone else had already done it a decade earlier (and probably many others before that).

Either way, you’ll also be delighted to learn that the National Monuments Service (NMS) have taken past intrusions of Poulnabrone seriously and have since installed a high-tech security perimeter (a rope) around it. Here’s a picture of me studying it carefully with the son last year, while reliving old glory days! After careful assessment, I came to the conclusion that there was no way I could possibly have overcome such an obstacle.

Well done, the NMS!

Next time you visit Poulnabrone I hope you think of me and Charles Merrill!

Congratulations and well done, Mr De Luca.

Note: This article was first published in Vóg, our monthly newsletter in Nov 2017.

Self-Beauty in Glendalough

This year, I managed to sneak a quick visit to one of my favourite sites back in Ireland, the beautiful valley of Gleann Dá Loch (Valley of Two lakes), anglicized as Glendalough.

The valley’s always been inhabited although, given the spiel at the local visitor centres and tourist offices, you’d be forgiven for thinking life didn’t exist there until the sixth century when a Christian monastic-style settlement was founded by St. Kevin. Following a particular Christian belief system based around strict reflection and meditation, St. Kevin chose Gleann Dá Loch not only for it’s beauty but for its isolated location. The site would almost certainly have had some tribal importance as well but its isolation certainly made it perfect for the monks to live a quiet life of spiritual reflection.

Over a hundred years later, St Kevin must have been spinning in his grave for by the middle of the seventh century, Glendalough was an enormous and very wealthy monastery. By the eight century, the monastery is believed to have employed almost 1000 laypeople.

In some ways, Glendalough success was also its undoing. As a rich site, it was ripe for plundering and between 775 and 1095 it was raided numerous times, not only by Vikings but by local tribes. Generally each time it was raided, the buildings were set alight which is why you won’t find anything there today that dates from before the 10th century. By the time, English forces left it in ruins (1398), the dioceses of Glendalough and Dublin had also been united which meant that from that point onwards, its political and ecclesiastical status were also substantially eroded. By the 18th and 19th century, the site was a religious backwater, famous only for the raucous celebrations held on the 3rd of June (St Kevin’s Day) and otherwise ignored.

I was a bit blown away when I got to Gleann Dá Loch. It had probably been at least twelve years or more since I’d last visited (and even then the place was heaving) but I was genuinely gobsmacked by the sheer volume of buses dumping people off to be flushed through the visitor centre, the monastery, the lakes and of course the tourist shops. The tourism turnover at Glendalough is clearly a well-oiled machine.

Having seen the ruins and the visitor centre years ago, I bypassed all of that, making a dash to escape two busloads of westerners in orange, Oriental style ‘monk’ suits (I was tempted but I didn’t ask!). I was hoping to get to the lake ahead of them and have a minute or two by myself but instead I found it was already occupied by several Asian couples. That didn’t particularly bother me but I was struck by the huge number of them taking selfies with the lake as a backdrop.

It was only as I was walking around the Wicklow hills later that day that I began to understand the significance of what I’d seen. Gleann Dá Loch, like all beautiful scenic spots has always attracted seasonal tourists. That’s no biggie. It’s a simple fact of life and you can always enjoy it’s beauty more selfishly outside the tourist period.

No, I think what had really startled me was the selfies. One hundred years ago, fifty years ago and even twenty years ago, when tourists went to see a famous site of immense beauty they tried to capture that beauty by taking photographs so that they could look on it and enjoy it in years to come. Nowadays, when tourists go to a beauty spot, photographic memories are cheap and instantly downloadable online. As a result, they take photographs of themselves at the tourist spot.

It’s an interesting variant but I’m still not entirely sure what it means or even what it says about us as a species.

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The Tailor and Ansty- A Review

I first came across a copy of The Tailor and Ansty about 25 years ago when I was dossing in the basement of a large house in Bath (England). I’d been visiting my girlfriend for the weekend and the whole event had taken on a surreal nature as we’d broken up during a burlesque circus that was performing there. I ended up stuck, penniless, in a city where I knew no-one and had to spend a full Saturday night there before I could catch the train (and ferry) back to Cork. In the end, I was fortunate enough to find accommodation in the basement of a (very) large house in the centre of town, where a distant acquaintance was flatting.

I found the copy of ‘The Tailor and Ansty’ discarded on the floor of that basement with some old magazines. To be honest, I was a bit surprised to find that particular Irish book there – and a bit curious as well. Over the years, I’d heard it references to it at home but never fully in context, so although I was familiar with the title, I actually had no idea what it was about. I think, at the time, I simply assumed it would be similar to Joyce or Myles na gCopeleen.

With nothing else to do, I picked it up and read it.

The first thing that struck me was the easy readability. Cross had a lovely, nonchalant style that made it a pleasure to read from the very first page.

“In the townland of Garrnapeaka, in the district of Inchigeela, in the parish of Iveleary, in the barony of West Muskerry, in the county of Cork, in the province of Munster” – as he magniloquently styles his address, lives the Tailor.
His small whitewashed cottage, with its acre of ground, stands at the brow of a hill, at the side of a road which winds and climbs into a deep glen of the mountains bordering Cork and Kerry.

If you don’t know much about the story, it really is very simple and concerns Eric Cross’ record of his interactions with two elderly individuals: Timothy Buckley (the laid back and talkative Tailor) and his ever-nagging wife Anastasia (Ansty) in 1940’s Gougane Barra (West Cork). For me, it was something of a surprise to learn that not only was the setting close to where I’d lived and grown up but that the characters were (or, rather, had been) real individuals.

The book is gently humorous (very funny at times) and gives a beautiful insight into the lives of people in rural Ireland at a time when there was no entertainment apart from shaggy stories and philosophical musings. Mostly, the book concerns the Tailor’s amusingly erudite – if unscholarly – ramblings and various interactions between the couple and their friends and neighbours and their almost obsessive care of their single cow. Because of their age (the Tailor and Ansty were quite elderly and retired at the time Eric Cross knew them) both were very much set in their ways and, after over forty years of living together, had a polished routine of abuse and affection that comes through in the book. If you’re looking for action and high drama, you won’t find it here but you’ll not find a better antidote to modern life either.

Now that you know a bit about what the book, you might be surprised to learn the associated history. Back in 1942, when the book was first published, it ended up being banned by the Irish Censorship Publications Board as it didn’t align with de Valera’s view of what the new Ireland should look like (Ireland had only recently become independent). Neither did the old couples’ belief in the ‘fairies’ align with the spiritual purity demanded by the increasingly powerful Irish Catholic church. The book was described as ‘pornographic’, which was, of course, utter nonsense. That didn’t prevent a number of senior Catholic priests arriving to the Tailor’s house in Gougane Barra and forcing the old man down on his knees to burn a copy of the book.

In this respect, the Tailor and Ansty was really the first troubling signal of the potential abuse of power of the national government. It was also a warning shot for the self-justified cruelty associated with the worst of religious fanaticism (something that would eventually lead to the horrors of the Magdalene Laundries and abuse of children in Irish religious institutions).

Thirty years later, I still have the original copy I found on the floor of that basement in Bath. I’m still exceptionally grateful for finding it. Not only did it provide some timely (and well needed) distraction at a time when I needed it, it remains one of my favourite books to this day.

In case you’re wondering, I woke at dawn the following morning to get the first train out of Bath, although the whole surreal theme continued for a while. As I was making my way through the deserted – but strikingly beautiful streets – towards the station, I kept hearing an odd venting noise (something that sounded eerily like the breathing apparatus of Darth Vader’s helmet). I looked around several times trying to work out what was causing it but, on each occasion, could see absolutely nothing. Finally, something prompted me to look up and there, overhead, was a hot-air balloon in the shape of a large house, drifting low over the streets of the city.

It seemed like an apt end to the weekend.

This review originally appeared in Vóg (our monthly newsletter) in 2016.

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What Comes Next: Update On Production

It’s been a while since I provided an update about what we’re working on here at present (apart from the monthly updates in Vóg, of course).

Despite two months of frantic activity and very ink-stained hands, very little is actually visible in terms of material release. If you’re a regular reader however, you’ll probably know we generally have about ten different projects on the go at any one time, some with higher priority than others (and constantly shifting in response to circumstances). At this stage, the main focus is on the following:

Liath Luachra II:
I’m currently working on Chapter 5 of this and going hell for leather to have a very rough first draft completed by Christmas. Stylistically, this is probably going to be more commercial than my other works as it veers away from the established Fenian Cycle and mythological cannon and more into fantasy territory. That said, like most of my other books, I doubt this is ever going to be a mainstream, mass-market bestseller. I have my niche and I’m comfortable there.

The books is a ‘stand alone’ although it does follow on from the events in Liath Luachra: The Grey One. A number of characters from that book turn up in this one as well.

Project Scéalta
I hadn’t actually expected to get anything done on this before Christmas but ended up spending a full week on it earlier this month. Hoping to release this towards the end of next year. I’m VERY excited abut this one.

Celtic Mythology Collection 3
The current Celtic Mythology Short Story Competition launched in September and we’ve had a few submissions dribbling in since then – less than 10 at this stage – but given that the deadline is December, that’s not unusual. We’re also finalizing the cover and the judges for that. I’m hoping to be able to share the cover sometime in the next month or so.

Project Bán
This project – a non fiction one – has been on the go for over two years and progressing very slowly. Essentially, it’s a practical field guide to Irish mythology and we hope to get it out sometime next year. Based on a ‘white paper’ that I was working on, it simply became too complex to put it out in that form.

I guess, now that I look at it, just thinking of all the work ahead would probably be exhausting if it wasn’t so personally rewarding.

Irish Fantasy Friday: 20 Oct 2017

A weekly update of Irish fantasy-related news – from an Irish perspective!

Dominated by GoT and Star Wars today!!

  • Liam-Cunningham says Game of Thrones stars are not making millions [Aaah, c’mon Liam!] (Irish Independent)
  • Impressive independent GoT Short Film (The White Wolf) by two Belfast men: (Irish News)
  • Go mbeidh an fórsa leat! — May the force be with you! Report on Star Wars VIII filming in Ireland (Ireland.com)
  • Kerry Independent TD reckons there’s more money to be milked from Star Wars VIII (Irish Independent)
  • And just in case you’re one of the few people who didn’t see the Skellig Islands Tourism Feature Star Wars VIII Trailer (YouTube)
  • Gaelcon 29 is happening next weekend: 27-30 October (Gaelcon)

Feel free to submit appropriate (i.e. relevant) posts for inclusion.

Irish Fantasy Friday: 13 Oct 2017

A weekly update of Irish fantasy-related news – from an Irish perspective!

  1. David Freyne’s The Cured wins ‘Best Horror Feature’ at the Fantastic Fest, America’s largest genre film festival (IFTN)
  2. Liam Cunningham insists he doesn’t when the last Game of Thrones episode goes to air (ah, c’mon Liam!!) (UPI)
  3. A Fantasy Map of Ireland stirs up more strife and argument than a Games of Thrones episode [Reddit and Poliics – a match made in heaven!] (Reddit)
  4. Derek Landy (of Skullduggery Pleasant fame) tries his hand at graphic novels with Secret Empire: Uprising (Bleeding Cool)
  5. Dublin’s Brown Bag Films working with Disney on Vampirina (RTE)

Feel free to submit appropriate (i.e. relevant) posts for inclusion.

Irish Fantasy Friday

With the 2017 Octocon kicking off this weekend, we decided it’d be timely for an update on Irish fantasy-related stories.

  1. An interesting insight to the ‘extras’ casting call process for Vikings: Season 6, much of which is shot in Ireland (Project Casting )
  2. The trailer for Vikings: Season 6 – just a little bit of mayhem! (Youtube)
  3. The search on for an Irish boy to play the lead role in the upcoming movie adaptation of Eoin Colfer’s fantasy novel Artemis Fowl (RTE)
  4. With Game of Thrones’ Littlefinger now kicking up the daisies, Aidan Gillen plays the title role in controversial Irish comedian Dave Allen’s life story (Telegraph)
  5. Fairfield University screening its 10th annual movie series of “The Irish in Film” (Hartford Courant) – (beware annoying pop-ups)
  6. The ‘Dark Hedges’ Preservation Trust set up to protect the tree-lined avenue made famous in Game of Thrones being probed (Irish News)
  7. And of course …. Octocon

Getting Lost with the Ancient Hillfort Atlas

Earlier this year, a database entitled The Atlas of Hillforts of Great Britain and Ireland was made available online but, unfortunately, this wasn’t without some controversy. In particular, a lot of people were unhappy with the term ‘hillfort’ because it’s quite an inaccurate term to use for many of the sites identified in the Atlas, most of which were believed to have a ritualistic/social nature rather than a military/defence one.

Funded though through the British Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC), the Atlas was established through a project facilitated by University College Cork, the University of Edinburgh and the University of Oxford. The information gathered for it was collected by over a hundred volunteers who visited the sites and input the data gathered. Over time, the plan is to allow the Atlas to be updated by volunteers who upload their own images and text.

Like most projects there are pros and cons with the ‘Hillfort Atlas/Database’. The ‘pro’ is that it identifies where many ancient sites are located and by making this information available online, it encourages people to go and interact with them – certainly a positive outcome.

The ‘con’ is that although the ancient sites are identified, there’s very little information provided on the site and much of that (from the database title down) is misleading and encourages misinterpretation. In addition, there very little actual data available on the website apart from the locations, a minimal explanation of hillforts, and links to a few related (university) books.

Essentially, the Atlas project team seem to be saying

“Look, here’s a map of old sites we’re generically going to call “hillforts” – even if they’re not. Also, here’s a list of books you might like to read if you want to try and make sense of it. Good luck with all that!”

Generally speaking, therefore, the Atlas is all a bit of a half-assed job and one gets the impression the universities only carried it out to obtain some easy funding from the AHRC or as a cheap publicity gimmick. From the final product, there certainly doesn’t appear to have been any attempt to:

  • define the project in a way that would assemble some meaningful data
  • analyse and present that information to the public in a way that might actually have been useful

The Hillfort Atlas itself can be found here: The Atlas

Good luck. You’ll probably need it.

Irish Mythology, Newly Discovered Werewolves and Other People’s Spin

Much of what people see as Irish folklore and Irish mythology today, is actually a confused muddle of snippets of fact, cultural misinterpretation, Chinese whispers, intentional and unintentional misinformation. Generally speaking, the latter tends to be disseminated by bloggers who aren’t Irish (but have an interest in what they call ‘Celtic’ mythology) however most people are surprised to learn that the more proactive form of cultural misinformation started way back in the 12th century with an individual known as Giraldus Cambrensis (Gerald of Wales).

Born in 1146, Gerald of Wales was the scion of a noble family (he was the son of William Fitz odo de Barry or Barri, one of Wales most powerful Anglo-Norman barons). Like his peers, Gerald had a healthy appreciation for power and for those who wielded it. Driven by ambition, he placed himself in positions associated with powerful men, ceaselessly self-promoted and worked his way up the social/political ladder until he was appointed archdeacon of Brecon in 1174 (a role he obtained by ‘dobbing in’ the previous archdeacon for having a live-in mistress).

Propelled by this success, Gerald soon managed to inveigle his way into the role of royal clerk and chaplain to King Henry II and, following the Norman invasions of Ireland (in 1169 and 1171), secured the prestigious position of accompanying the King’s son (Earl John – later, King John as of Robin Hood fame) on a tour of the conquered lands.

During this exploratory visit to Ireland, in an effort to impress his masters, Gerald commenced a propaganda piece known as the Topographia Hibernica (The Topography of Ireland). Even at the time, this document was remarkable not only for its length but the amazing depths of prejudicial description that portrayed the native Irish as depraved barbarians.

Published in 1188, Gerald’s account proved immensely popular in Great Britain with the ruling Norman classes as it’s dehumanisation of the Irish helped justify their invasion and the subsequent treatment of the natives. It’s important not to dismiss the impact of the Topographia Hibernica as many of its ‘factual’ descriptions established those stereotypes of the “wild Irish” that continued up to the early modern period (and which some would argue continue today).

Surprisingly, despite the fact that the Topographia Hibernica has been discredited for centuries, you’ll still find contemporary bloggers quoting liberally from it in an effort to justify their own particular passions or interests (usually related to fantasy beliefs or ‘Celtic Reconstructionist’ ramblings which are then linked – kicking and screaming – to Irish mythology). To be fair, reading some of Gerald’s writing is actually quite hilarious from a contemporary viewpoint but the fact that this was a propaganda document written by a non-Irish person and an official government spin-doctor for the Norman government, seems to have flown over the heads of many of the quoting bloggers. As in Geralds’ day, it seems people will still rearrange the facts to suit themselves.

Most internet content about Irish mythology tends to be created by non-Irish fantasy and ‘Celtic’ Reconstructionists – hence most of it is completely wrong.

 

One example I pulled from the Topographia Hibernica involves a fanciful ‘record’ of some Irish people being ‘part-wolf’. It reads as follows:

Of the prodigies of our times, and first of a wolf which conversed with a priest

I now proceed to relate some wonderful occurrences which have happened within our times. About three years before the arrival of Earl John in Ireland, it chanced that a priest who was journeying from Ulster to Meath, was benighted in a certain wood on the borders of Meath. While, in company with only a young lad, he was watching by a fire which he had kindled under the branches of a spreading tree, lo! A wolf came up to them and immediately addressed them to this effect.

“Rest secure, and be not afraid, for there is no reason you should fear, where no fear is.”

The travellers being struck with astonishment and alarm, the wolf added some orthodox words referring to God. The priest then implored him, and adjured him by Almighty God and faith in the Trinity, not to hurt them, but to inform them what creature it was that in the shape of a beast uttered human words. The wolf, after giving catholic replies to all questions, added at last:

“There are two of us, a man and a woman, natives of Ossory, who, through the curse of one Natalis, saint and abbot, are compelled every seven years to put off the human form, and depart from the dwellings of men. Quitting entirely the human form, we assume that of wolves. At the end of the seven years, if they chance to survive, two others being substituted in their places, they return to their country and their former shape. And now, she who is my partner in this visitation lies dangerously sick not far from hence, and, as she is at the point of death, I beseech you, inspired by divine charity, to give her the consolations of your priestly office.”

At this word, the priest followed the wolf trembling, as he led the way to a tree, at no great distance in the hollow of which he beheld a she-wolf, who under that shape was pouring forth human sighs and groans. On seeing the priest, having saluted him with human courtesy, she gave thanks to God, who in this extremity had vouchsafed to visit her with such consolation. She then received from the priest all the rites duly performed, as far as the last communion. This also she importantly demanded, earnestly supplicating him to complete his good offices by giving her the viaticum. The priest stoutly asserting that he was not provided with it, the he-wolf, who had withdrawn to a short distance, came back and pointed out a small missal-book, containing some consecrated wafers, which the priest carried on his journey, suspended from his neck, under his garment, after the fashion of the country. He then intreated him not to deny them the gift of God, and the aid destined them by Divine Providence; and, to remove all doubt, using his claw for a hand, he tore off the skin of the she-wolf, form the head down to the navel, folding it back. Thus she immediately presented the form of an old woman. The priest, seeing this, and compelled by his fear more than his reason, gave the communion; the recipient having earnestly implored it, and devoutly partaking of it. Immediately afterwards, the he-wolf rolled back the skin and fitted it to its original form.

These rites having been duly, rather than rightly, performed the he-wolf gave them his company during the whole night at their little fire, behaving more like a man than a beast. When morning came, he led them out of the wood, and, leaving the priest to pursue his journey, pointed to him the direct road for a long distance. At his departure, he also gave him many thanks for the benefit he had conferred, promising him still greater returns of gratitude if the Lord should call him back from his present exile, two parts of which he had already completed. At the close of their conversation, the priest inquired of the wolf whether the hostile race which had now landed on the island would continue there for the time to come, and be established in it. To which the wolf replied: –

“For the sins of our nation, and their enormous vices, the anger of the Lord, falling on an evil generation, hath given them into the arms of their enemies. Therefore, as long as this foreign race shall keep the commandments of the Lord, and walk in his ways, it will be secure and invincible; but if, as the downward path to illicit pleasures is easy, and nature is prone to follow vicious examples, this people shall chance, from living among us, to adopt our depraved habits, doubtless they will provoke the divine vengeance on themselves also.”

It’s quite likely that Gerald received additional brownie points from his masters for the final paragraph which essentially suggests the native Irish deserved everything they got (i.e. being invaded) as they were essentially sinful.

As you can see, Gerald of Wales had no particular qualms using fiction to portray the natives as partly inhuman (something which aligned well with the Roman Church who often likened native Irish war parties as ‘wolf bands’). This is something he also did in other sections of the document such as:

  • Of a fish which had three golden teeth
  • Of a woman who had a beard, and a hairy crest and mane on her back
  • Of an animal who was half-ox, half-man
  • Of a goat who had intercourse with a woman
  •  Yadda, yadda, yadda.

You get the idea.

I came across the above section as a result of some research I was carrying out on Irish wolves for one of my books (Liath Luachra: The Swallowed)  and, to my great amusement, discovered numerous bloggers have used this section to argue their belief that there have always been werewolves in Ireland.

On the bright side of course, we should probably thank our lucky stars they weren’t quoting Mein Kampf.